Thanks to all for the advice you gave regarding my refusing-to-eat Gravy the other day. She enjoyed a trip to the vet during which she was pronounced healthy but angry, and we were given a laxative to help her pass hairballs, which seems to be part of the problem (another part is that she’s a brat). She’s been eating about 50% of her food since (but only dry kibble, no wet food — what a weirdo) and unhappily licking her daily dose of laxative off her paws, because I’ll be damned if I’m going to try to smear that stuff on the roof of her mouth as my vet so easily did. I got a claw deep in my hand last night in my attempt to do so and promptly gave up. It’s just too hot to fight with her.
Two things. (1) I love the name “Gravy” so very much, and (2) I’m going to start asking the vet to diagnose some of my cats with “Healthy but angry.”
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I love how your plates match the cats 🙂
I find it very important to have the cats match the household. Or the household match the cats. You’ll note that the cabinets and the cats blend together nicely, too!
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Noelegy said: I got the goofies today. I looked back at that picture, and this is what popped into my head:
“We represent the Litterbox Guild,
The Litterbox Guild,
The Litterbox Guild…”
You are welcome for that earworm. 🙂
And then Sourpuss said: That would be a fantastic name for a kitty blog!
Best kitty blog name idea ever! Someone out there needs to jump on that!
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This may seem like a random question… What font are you using for the watermark? I really like it. I won’t steal your pics, but I may steal the font! 😉
That font is Gabriola. I like it because it’s script-y and flow-y and not block-y (I tend to prefer either script-y fonts, or no-nonsense Arial. Nothing in-between!)
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OK, let me wax poetic about your amazing photography skillz because it’s darn near impossible to get a half-way decent photo of a squirming kitten, let alone an entire blog worth of gorgeous ones like yours. My camera is on it’s last legs and needs replacing, but I’m not sure that even with a new camera I’d be able to get shots like yours… between natural kitten bounciness and the camera strap/lens cap being the BEST TOYZ EVER(!) I’ve got lots of blurry cute on my memory card right now. But they are excessively adorable blurs, I promise!
I am NOT kidding when I say that I maybe keep one out of every 100 pictures I take. Thank god for digital cameras!
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Any word on more Noms being adopted?
No more Noms adopted yet – I think that adoptions slow down during holidays – but I have a good feeling about this weekend! Fingers crossed!
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Spanky looks like he’s losing weight… is he OK?
and
I’m too lazy to search, but has Spanky been tested for his thyroid? Our old cat had an overactive thyroid and was skinnier and skinnier for the last couple of years of her life. There was just no way to fatten her up no matter how much she ate. But she seemed happy enough until right at the end. He’s still my favourite.
Spanky has lost some weight, and after several visits to the vet and every test under the sun, it’s determined that he’s healthy and there’s nothing wrong with him. I think, honestly, it’s just part of his getting old (he’s almost 16). He’s always been picky, but he’s just not that interested in eating these days. I tempt him with all of his favorites – raw meat, dabs of yogurt, jars of baby food, cans of kitten food – and sometimes he eats everything I give him, and sometimes he takes a bite or two and then he’s done. At this point, pretty much any food he shows the slightest bit of interest in is his if he wants it.
He’s thin, but he’s happy, so I’m not taking him to the vet any more. He freaks out so badly that it takes him a week to recover. As long as he’s happy and eating sometimes and getting around okay, I’m happy.
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How much longer will she be nursing the kittens??
That is entirely up to Brandywine- she’s made it clear to the kittens lately that she’s not the 24/7 milk bar, so I’d say she’s in the process of weaning them. They’re all eating solid food just fine, and they’ve gotten the snack time routine down pat – they follow me around the room howling when they know it’s snack time. I generally leave weaning up to the mama cats – last year, Maggie’s kittens were almost 4 months old when they went off to Petsmart, and they were still nursing whenever they could. In fact, the babies were in a cage separate from Maggie, and I had to put a note on the cage that it was okay to let Maggie and the kittens out together, but not to let them nurse. Lisa reported that she let them out and within seconds the little monsters were latched on. I think they’d STILL be nursing if they could!
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I think you’re slacking….you’re missing a banner on the right for the Maters bunch!
There’s no banner for the ‘Maters, and there’s no Permanent Residents page for Rupert. I am a total slacker – but those are on my to-do list!
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So happy for Mr. Stomps-a-lot finding a home… he is such a cutie pie… remind me how old he is, compared to the Maters n Taters. Or, is he just a small little runt?
Stompers is two months old as of yesterday, Norland and Russet are just over three months old. The little Taters are about 10 days younger than Norland and Russet. And the ‘Maters are about 8 weeks – Stompers is actually guesstimated to be a few days older than the ‘Maters are.
The only reason Kennebec, Agata, and Fianna haven’t been spayed and neutered yet is because it was taking Fianna forEVER to get to two pounds. She finally has (and Kennebec’s at three!), so they’ll be going to the clinic soon.
Stompers hovered at 1 pound, 4 ounces for ages, it seemed, but he’s started to put on weight in the last few days. He’s currently at a pound and a half.
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We adopted two kittens last year and I update their foster moms every so often.. I am not sure that my updates are especially welcome – there never seems to be much of a response. Just wondering how you feel about the frequency of updates and should I give it up after we’ve had them for a year.
I absolutely LOVE getting updates about my former fosters, and I don’t think I could ever get enough of them. I love hearing how they’re doing, and love seeing what they look like as they’ve grown up.
Connie had this to add, which I think was right-on:
I can tell you I LOVE them when I get them. Often it is hard to know what to say because you know the kitties have moved on and aren’t “mine” any more. I don’t want to say anything to offend or come off incredibly crazy (I expect people to think I’m a little crazy)
You could always ask. There are a slew of different reasons to suggest why sending photos might not be appropriate (too big for her mail server, work email, too many emails, too busy, etc) you can pick one, even if it seems silly, and ask. If she takes the excuse then you have your answer. If she says no way I love seeing them, then you know you aren’t bothering her.
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Here’s something I learned the hard way. Our cat kneaded and sucked regularly. I gave him a nice small sheepskin type “blanket” and he adored it, carried it around in his mouth (so cute!) and nursed on it. A lot. After a year or so, he started vomiting so off he went to the vet’s with his blanket in his crate for comfort. They kept him for 2 days and did a set of xrays requiring anesthesia plus blood work only to finally decide it was bits of fluff in his digestive system. Much worry and $900 later (I know!!) we brought him home, threw out his blanket and haven’t had any issues since. That was 3 years ago. Mind you, the sheepskin was very shaggy so tufts came off fairly easily I guess. He still kneads and sucks occasionally, but on a low pile blanket or towel and not very often. I felt very stupid and a lot poorer after that episode!
I’m so glad your kitty is okay (but sorry about the vet bill!). This is a great tip – the beds and blankets that the kittens suck on here have been through the wash a million times and are pretty threadbare, but I always tug on the area where they’re sucking to make sure nothing is coming up. We don’t want any blockages, that’s for sure!
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I am deeply envious of your pool. It was 102 here yesterday, supposed to be in the 90-100 range for the next TEN DAYS which is completely insane because this is June in Ohio. I should get a pool. And keep it filled with ice water while I pray for the heat to break.
It was over 100 here for a few days in a row. The water in the pool was very warm – no coolness to it at all – and I did my very best to convince Fred to go over to the dollar store and buy 20 bags of ice to put in the pool. Instead, he ran some water from the well into the pool to cool it down a bit, so that helped. I love our pool an awful lot, I just wish we’d put it under a tree, or partially under a tree, so it wouldn’t get quite so warm.
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LOL! The Smitten Kitten is a sex-toy shop in Uptown Minneapolis. 😀
Inspector Stompers not judging you.
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Enjoying the produce but it’s kind of overwhelming. You must have a really big freezer. What is in the bucket at 2 o’clock? I can’t make it out but they look almost like artichoke silhouettes.
Those are turnips. We didn’t end up with many of them – Fred really planted them for the greens, but after I harvested the greens last month, we saw that there were some pretty big turnips growing, so we let them get a bit bigger and then pulled them up.
We do have lots of freezer space – not only do we have the freezer space in our TWO refrigerators (the refrigerator we had at our previous house was too big for the space in our kitchen here, so we put it in the laundry room), but we have one upright freezer in the laundry room (which is where most of the veggies we freeze go) and two chest freezers in the garage (which mostly hold meat). Given all the freezer space we have and all the stuff we freeze, you’d think there were a lot more than two people living here. On the up side, we don’t spend much on groceries!
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We had our first locally grown corn this weekend. Since it has been so dry the sugar was more concentrated in the corn and boy was it good. I told Dave I would ask you how you process corn to freeze. Do you ever freeze it on the cob?
I do freeze it on the cob, though this year I’m cutting all the corn off the cobs and freezing it in bags because we have a fairly limited amount of freezer space for corn. You can actually just put the ears, still in the husk, in bags in the freezer. I’ve done it that way, and I’ve shucked the corn and blanched it before freezing, and I think it’s better if you leave it in the husk.
I’ve been blanching the corn (Fred’s kind enough to shuck it before he brings it in) and then cutting it off the cob (I use a mandoline – this one), scrape the cob with a knife to get all the corny (heh) goodness out, and then bag it in 2-cup bags and stick it in the freezer.
I swear I could eat corn at every meal!
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Do you amend your soil/fertilize/etc. every year? My garden looks so lovely but doesn’t always produce a ton… this year I tested the soil and needed mass quantities of nitrogen and potassium which I tried to provide so we’ll see if it’s better…
A few years ago, Fred sent off a soil sample and I don’t remember what the results were, but he amended the entire garden, and that year was nothing to write home about. This year when we were planting, we put a healthy scoop of composted chicken poop along the rows where we were planting. It seems to have helped a lot – I’ve never gotten such gorgeous tomatoes.
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Thanks everyone for your advice on the watermarking issue. After a lot of looking around, I’ve downloaded a program that will watermark a bunch of pictures at once, and will use the font I want. So for now they’ll be watermarked – though of course I reserve the right to get annoyed and stop again in the future. 🙂
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I love how Sungold is simultaneously wailing about how he’s STARVING to Brandywine, and draping his tail over Wellington’s head.
Wellington, eye on the feather teaser.
“COME HERE FEATHER TEASER!”
“Maybe if I am very very quiet…”
“If I flirt with it…”
“Look, feather teaser! Kitty belleh! Pay no mind to the flailing claws.”
“I can’t watch this…”
I cannot stand how gorgeous Dingwall Scotty is. It looks like he’s got white eyeliner on.
Brandywine takes a moment to chill out.
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I was actually putting this post together last night when I got the word that there’s room for Floofy and the Grump at Petsmart. So in a little while, I’ll be off to get them settled. They’ve actually been here a month, can you believe that?
I don’t have pictures of them today, but I have some on my camera that I’ll definitely share with y’all, so you haven’t seen the last of them!
I pulled this little plastic basket out from under the bed, and Stompers was instantly fascinated.
He climbed in and he and Kennebec smacked at each other.
Kennebec totally looks like Godzilla here.
The girls came over to check it out.
Stompers watched closely.
Kennebec climbed into the basket.
Then Stompers got another turn.
Look how gentle Stompers is here.
“Bless you, my child.”
And then it went terribly wrong. Kennebec reached into the basket and grabbed Stompers’ tail.
This picture makes me snicker every time I look at it. I wish my stupid leg wasn’t in the way, but the look on that little face cracks me UP. (Rest assured, Kennebec wasn’t hurting him, Stompers was just being a bit of a drama queen.)
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Silly, goofy (GORGEOUS) Corbs. Newt was just off camera, and Corbie was talking to him.
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Previously
2011: Or a stay of… adoptacution?
2010: No entry.
2009: Kinda creepy!
2008: No entry.
2007: It’s tough to be a Toms.
2006: No entry.
2005: Mia.